1. Para 78, page 8 of the Email at line 8 to read "But since my return to the US, I naturally withdrew any apology made since I had no intention of keeping it anyway..................................Queenstown Jail" not " I had intention of keeping".

This Defense of mine against these disciplinary proceedings by the Singapore Law Society is intended not only as a Defense to these proceedings but also to make known to the public at large as to what is happening; and who am I.

General background

1. I was born in Singapore , and lived with my parents and brothers and sisters there.

2. I was educated in Winstedt School 2, in Newton district of Singapore, then Raffles Institution, after which I went first to Frankfurt , Germany where I spent about 6 months working there. I was what in German one would say, Shwartzarbeiter (or in English "Black work"), meaning I was working without proper work papers. In other words, I was working illegally. I was then 23 years of age. This was an adventure.

3. Although I did not know a word of German before landing in Germany , I picked it up fast and by the time I left Germany , I was reasonably proficient. An interesting fact is that all European languages are connected and have similarities. If you knew English, German is easy to pick up.

4. My plan as the 20 year old young man was to go to Germany , earn enough money and then on to University of New Brunswick , Canada where I had admission to Matriculation and a Bachelor's course in Commerce. My only way to get to Canada was to earn enough money to do it, and Germany was my plan.

5. However in Germany , I was not making enough money let alone to save. I was earning DM800.00 per month in a shop selling general goods and my rent was DM 400.00 living at student accommodation at Wolfgang Goethe Universitat (University) in Holderlin Strasse 4, Frankfurt (near the Zoo).

6. I had earlier been denied a student visa by the British High Commission Singapore, to go to England to study since my late mother was at that time living in England. They felt that if they gave me a visa, I will not return to Singapore . Hence the visa denial.

7. Now since my Canadian hopes were dashed for lack of any money, and since I did not want to go back to Singapore , I tried to get to England from Germany .

8. I told my mother of my presence in Germany and asked them to help. My mother and sister appealed against the British High Commission's decision, which appeal was heard at Leeds Yorkshire England .

9. I won the appeal. I got my student visa issued at the British Consulate Frankfurt am Main, Bockenheimer Landstrasse, Frankfurt . I purchased a railway ticket from Frankfurt to London , on the Transalpino Express, originating Vienna Austria through the Austrian Alps and crossing into Germany into Munich and on to Frankfurt .

10. I boarded the train at 6 am in the morning at Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof (Main Railway Station), passing through Mainz, Koblenz, Bonn, Cologne and then into Belgium, Viviars, Liege, Brussels, Ghent St Peters, and then on to Ostend (Flanders, Belgium). At Ostend catch a ferry across the Channel, 4 hours, on to Dover Folkstone and there board British Rail to London Victoria, then to London Kings Cross, the train passing through Huntingdon, Peterborough, Doncaster, Wakefield Westgate, then Leeds; then on to Bradford, Yorkshire where my journey ends.

11. I spent 2 years studying my A levels in Bradford Technical College and then on to Hull University East Yorkshire, to study law and then one year at London doing my Bar Finals, at which time my education in England is over. I was admitted to the English Bar, Inner Temple , being placed 14th in order of merit in the 1979 English Bar Finals, out of a batch of one to 200 students. An achievement to be proud of.

12. I return to Singapore at the end of 1979 around December to start my career as a lawyer. I did not know what Singapore was and how corrupt the legal administration was. I did not know that Singapore was not a democracy and was in fact a dictatorship. I did not know that Singapore was a dictatorship; it’s dictator was in fact Lee Kuan Yew and that it was he who controlled every aspect of government in Singapore as well as the courts, the judges, the Law Society and the legal profession.

13. I was under the mistaken impression that one could in Singapore , like in any democracy, work hard at the law and succeed at it. I did not know that success at the Bar in Singapore required most importantly your loyalty to Lee Kuan Yew's People's Action Party and his patronage and support. If you have that, your success in Singapore as a lawyer is guaranteed. But in order to be so, you have to support Lee Kuan Yew's denial of the fundamental rights of his people, such as freedom of the press, and speech. You have to support his suppression of every form of criticism or dissent against him. In other words, you have to espouse the principles of Fascism, with Lee Kuan Yew as the Singaporean Fuhrer (the protector in German, referring to Adolf Hitler), or the Singaporean Ill Duce (the leader in Italian referring to the Fascist Italian Benito Mussolini).

14. After completing a short pupilage first with the late Harry Wee, then with Allen and Gledhill, then with Godwin and Partners, I was admitted to the Bar. This was in 1982.

15. I first got a job with Law firm Advani Hoo Morris and Kumar, then with Amarjit Rubin then with another firm and finally set up my own firm of Gopalan Nair in Colombo Court and then moved to Golden Mile Complex until I left Singapore in 1991.

16. To tell it briefly, very soon I was disappointed with the whole system. It was not what I thought. Certain selected individuals with Lee Kuan Yew connections did very well indeed. Those who did not ended up as the also ran.

17. The injustice to one man in particular made me very troubled. He was the opposition politician Joshua Benjamin Jeyaretnam (JB Jeyaretnam). Throughout the 1980s while I was practicing there in the island, I could see the law being repeatedly misused to persecute this man. Not one but a series of defamation law suits were commenced against him including one criminal case, where when one examines the facts there was not a single actionable defamation or crime in anything he did. But yet through these corrupt judges that Lee Kuan Yew has put in place (in fact all of them) like Lai Kew Chai, Sinnathuray and many others, Jeyaretnam is repeatedly punished, repeatedly impoverished and repeatedly bankrupted and sent to jail!

18. Under these circumstances I could not look my self in the mirror had I not done anything. I did what was the only right thing to do; I joined his political party, the Workers Party around 1984.

19. Since my joining his party I was persecuted not only by his courts but also by the people of Singapore . I suddenly found that I lost all my cases, both civil and criminal. The moment the judge realized it was me (remember there are no juries in Singapore ), he was trying very hard to do one thing, how to adjust his decision to find against my client.

20. Singapore ’s state controlled press gave headline news that I had joined the opposition Workers Party so that the people themselves could do what they have to do, that is to stay away from my law practice. Overnight my practice began to suffer, understandably. Which client in his right mind would want to hire me, when he knows that his case is as good as lost with me? At the same time, I began to lose all my friends as well.

21. Then this Lee Kuan Yew administration began their persecution against me. There were about 3 different cases.

22. In one case, I had represented a man called X, to maintain client confidentiality. He was indigent and of Eurasian descent. The facts were that he, just like the masses of Singaporeans was leasing a government owned HDB apartment. The apartment was left to him by his parents. The moneys due to the HDB remained outstanding. Being indigent he defaulted on his monthly payments. So they commenced eviction proceedings.

23. Mr. X was introduced to me by my childhood friend Bala who lives at Veerasamy Road . Mr. X is a rag and bone man who sells his wares along Rochore Canal with the others, also known as Sungei Road , Bombay 's equivalent of Thieves Market (in Hindi, Choor Bazaar).

24. In a little time, Mr. X was able to pay what owed. So naturally, this being good news, I wrote to the HDB on his behalf to stop all eviction proceedings because Mr. X will pay what was due.

25. You would not believe what I am about to say. The reply form the HDB was, it was not possible to stop the eviction proceedings because it is now too late. Since the eviction proceedings had already been started, there is nothing that can be done. My client has to be evicted anyhow.

26. Now like me, I am sure that you would find this unjust. Being a government housing agency, the HDB cannot act only on profit motives. They have a responsibility to the underprivileged; they have to have a sense of altruism and humanity. They should allow Mr. X to pay now and be allowed to keep his apartment that he had inherited from his father.

27. I wanted to tell the world about this injustice. It was during this time that Singapore ’s state controlled press had come up with a national party of sorts in the open space across from Lido cinema in Orchard Road . I am not sure but I think it was during the national Day Celebrations or New Years Day. Singaporeans dancing in the open was shown in the press with the words of Goh Chock Tong or someone else that "Singapore had the best outdoor party, the best political party, the best airport, the best sea port" and I am not sure the best what else.

28. I wrote a letter to the HDB asking whether is this what they mean by best party, best airport, best seaport, and enjoying themselves while a poor citizen of theirs is thrown out on the streets by the government housing agency. Is this what they mean when they say they care for Singaporeans?

29. As I wanted to tell the world about this injustice, I mailed this letter to the HDB also to various foreign embassies, consulates and high commissions of foreign countries in Singapore , such as the American Embassy, the British High Commission etc.

30. As threatened by the HDB, they threw my client on to the streets as well as all his belongings. I was told by Bala and subsequently by him that what the HDB did literally that, they just threw his things from his HDB flat out on the streets.

31. Very soon I received a latter from the Singapore Law Society, these very people who are now commencing these proceedings that the HDB had lodged a complaint against me for unethical conduct as a lawyer because, according to them, "I went beyond my scope of lawyering function" when I distributed my letter to the various Embassies and diplomatic posts in Singapore. Why? I did not see anything wrong with it? Do you?

31. While this proceedings were going on, or sometime in between, JB Jeyaretnam had just returned from London with good news. In his case, Law Society vs JB Jeyaretnam, the Privy Council, the Highest Court in England had found him totally innocent of any of the charges brought against him by the Singapore Law Society and that he should be restored to the Rolls of lawyers in Singapore .

32. Here is the background and my involvement in the case.

33. A while earlier, JB Jeyaretnam was charged once again, one of the many cases brought against him by this despot Lee Kuan Yew through his complaint courts. This time it was criminal charges.

34. After he was sued for defamation and was ordered to pay several hundreds of thousands of dollars in damages to Lee Kuan Yew, as is the fashion in Singapore , he put out a plea to the general public for donations.

35. He opened a Standard Chartered Account to collect these monies and I was appointed the Trustee to receive these funds.

36. A total of $14,000 or $15,000.00 was received into this account.

37. Among the donors, there were a couple of people who wanted to donate and had made out checks to the Workers Party.

38. I understand that JB Jeyaretnam had asked them to make out the check to him instead, since if the check was made out to the party, it would not benefit him since the party had already been would up by the courts.

39. You don't need to be a lawyer to know that there was nothing wrong in that. The money was the donor's. They could do anything they want with it. As they had changed the payee's names in the checks to JB Jeyaretnam, he was charged with criminal breach of trust for having diverted "funds belonging to the court liquidator to himself"!

40. Since JB Jeyaretnam knew, just as every normal human being would know that these moneys do not belong to the liquidator, he did not include these 2 sums in the sworn financial declaration he made to the courts. Mind you the sums in this case were only about $300.00.

41. As expected, Lee Kuan Yew ordered his Attorney general to charge Jeyaretnam. He was duly convicted in Singapore by Lee's obedient judges. Immediately thereafter, the Law Society under Lee's instructions disbars him.

42. Since at the time, legal profession disciplinary proceedings had an appeal available to the courts in London , which, you rightly guessed, not longer exists, JB Jeyartnam appealed to the Privy Council London.

43. In the tradition of fairness and justice the British court completely exonerated JB Jeyaretnam of all blame.

44. But what is important to note is this. The parties before the English court were the Law Society of Singapore represented by Singaporean lawyer Goh Joon Seng, from the law firm Lee and Lee (Lee Kuan Yew's law firm) and British Queen’s Counsel whose name I cannot remember. JB Jeyaretnam represented himself with British Queen's Counsel Martin Thomas.

45. Since the question of whether JB Jeyaretnam should be disciplined for his Singapore criminal convictions would depend on whether the Singapore court judgments were correct, it would be necessary for the English judges to look into the evidence once again and see whether JB Jeyaretnam was in fact guilty. Therefore since it was the Singapore Attorney General Tan Boon Teck who conducted these proceedings, the English court felt that it was necessary to permit the Singapore Attorney General to be present in the proceedings so as to both assist and respond to anything relating to the Singapore criminal charges.

46. So the English judges had asked the Singapore Law Society lawyer in the court "Is the Attorney General of Singapore aware of these proceedings" and "Does he wish to appear in these proceedings" since the criminal convictions are now in issue.

47. Both counsel for the Singapore Law Society affirmatively responded that the " Singapore Attorney General is aware and does not wish to appear". Only after being assured of this, did the court go on to hear the case. The court very quickly found JB Jeyaretnam totally innocent of all charges. And they ordered the Singapore Law Society to restore him to the Rolls of Lawyers.

48. After Jeyaretnam returned to Singapore , he applied for a "pardon" from the President of Singapore since the English court had totally exonerated him of all blame.

49. Mr. Tan Boon Teck, then the Attorney General of Singapore writes on behalf of the President of Singapore denying JB Jeyaretnam the pardon. For his reasons he says “That he (the Attorney General of Singapore) was not given an opportunity to be heard before the English Court " and secondly "JB Jeyaretnam had not shown remorse repentance and contrition for the crimes he had committed"!

50. And this outrageous response was published in full by Singapore ’s state controlled press and I read it.

51. Surely you can see what I saw. How can this Attorney General of Singapore so shamelessly say that "he was not given an opportunity to appear" before the English court, when it was absolutely clear that he knew about the case.

52. And surely you can see that Mr. Jeyaretnam is not required to show any “remorse repentance or contrition" for crimes he did not commit!

53. Naturally I was more than disappointed to read the Attorney General's complete denial of the truth. So I had to act and I did. I wrote to him to explain how in Heavens he could say that he "was not given an opportunity to appear in the English court" when he clearly was? And I asked him why in Heavens’ should Jeyaretnam show "remorse repentance and contrition" when he hadn’t committed any crime?

54. He replied by calling my letter "scurrilous" and that "if I needed any answers, I should write to Mr. Jeyaretnam since he was not a party to the proceedings”.

55. Since his response to me was completely unsatisfactory, I wrote to him again telling him that he should reply to me and answer my questions and if not I will circulate the correspondence between us to all the law firms in Singapore. His response was that he was going to report me to the Law Society for discipline, this very same organization that is now proceeding against me for unethical conduct.

56. I then sent my letter to him, his to me and my response to him to all law firms in Singapore via facsimile.

57. The charges against me were that I had "threatened the Attorney General" and that I had made "false accusations against the Attorney General". I fail to see how informing him of my intention to distribute the letters to Singapore lawyers is an "actionable threat" and secondly how asking the Attorney General questions on a public matter can amount to 'false accusations'.

58. The disciplinary hearing was conducted in camera. Very convenient for them, since no one else can know what really happened. But I do have the transcripts, thank God. The Disciplinary hearings judge was the late Choor Singh who was only interested, not unexpectedly, to please Lee Kuan Yew by finding me guilty as quickly as possible. The Law society's Counsel was Madam Assomull who was trying very hard to do any amount of dirty work for the Lee Kuan Yew administration to profit thereby and advance his career. It does appear however that all that willingness to bend over backwards to please the Singaporean powers doesn’t seem to have done him much good. Has a small cheap office now in High Street’s Peninsula Plaza Telephone: (65) 6339 4466. You might want to ask him what went wrong.

59. As expected I was disciplined. I was suspended from practice for 2 years for writing that letter to the Singapore Attorney General. But it did not really affect me, because this final judgment of suspension of a three judge High Court judgment came only after I left Singapore permanently in December 1991.

60. Then finally before I left Singapore , there was another case against me, this time for contempt of court. In 1991 I stood for the by elections as a Workers party candidate for the constituency of Bukit Merah. This was a time when JB Jeyaretnam had been bankrupted and could not stand for elections. I made a speech at an election rally there saying something on these lines "vote for the Workers Party. If you vote for us, we will change the way Subordinate Courts judges are appointed. At present the appointment of Subordinate Court judges are made by the Legal Service Commission which is headed by the Attorney General. This gives an impression of bias when it comes to cases against the government. Some may believe that the judge made the decision because he feared for his job and career. If we came to power, we would make the appointment of these judges independent of the Legal Service Commission".

61. I think, and I am sure you will too, if you happened to be a normal human being that there was nothing wrong in what I said. It was common sense to see that there could be a perception of bias in such cases.

62. I was charged this time for contempt of court. The charge stated that I had accused the Subordinate Court of bias by what I said. The judge this time was TS Sinnathuray, well known for being Lee Kuan Yew's man to polish off any contender.

63. The judge, expectedly, found me guilty as charged. He fined me $8,000.00 or if I did not pay, 2 months in jail. I paid the fine.

64. By this time I was thoroughly disillusioned by the whole system of law in Singapore . I was fed up with the judges, with the law and with the lawyers, whom, I saw as completely spineless.

65. Of course not all accepted this nonsense. Many left the country permanently mainly for Australia . The average man today in Singapore has no respect for the law. As evidence of this malaise, there are no more than 3000 or so practicing lawyers in Singapore today in an island of nearly 5 million people. There have been numerous attempts by the Singapore Administration to increase the number of lawyers by putting out numerous reports that it is an international legal center and so on. Since the world already knows how bad the situation is in Singapore as to the law, it is not surprising that that it is unable to attract more lawyers to the profession.

66. I am very sure that I will be disbarred in Singapore ; there is no doubt about it. But this in no way bothers me since I have not been practicing there since 1991, and furthermore I cannot even travel to the island as the government there has placed a restriction on my entry.

67. I am still on the Rolls of Lawyers in Singapore even though I have not practiced there since 1991. In order to practice in Singapore , you not only have to be on the Rolls of Lawyers, you have to apply for a practicing certificate every year. I am on the Rolls but have not applied for a practicing certificate since 1991. Therefore I cannot practice there at all. By this procedure to strike me off the Rolls, they are in effect denying me the right to ever apply for a practicing certificate in Singapore .

68. Since my adventure in Singapore last year, my blog Singapore Dissident has received great exposure in the world. Many Singaporeans also read it and the readership is steadily increasing.

69. I hope with my disbarment in Singapore and the publicity this generates, even more lawyers will leave Singapore in disgust and the administration will find even more difficulty in attracting new candidates to the profession. In this respect we should all do what we can to expose this dictatorship and weaken it as best we can. That way, we can lay the foundations for a democratic and free society.

Background to this case

70. I live in California , USA . I am now an American citizen. I went to Singapore on May 26, 2008 to witness the hearing to assess the quantum on damages in the Lee Kuan Yew vs Dr. Chee Soon Juan case in the Singapore High Court which was to last 3 days from May 26, 2008 to May 28, 2008. My interest to witness this hearing was increased because it was reported that Lee Kuan Yew, the Singapore strongman and his son will be testifying in open court. I arrived on an early morning flight arriving Singapore May 26, 2008, my intention being to depart Singapore on about a week thereafter on or about June 1, 2008.

After witnessing the 3 days of hearing I wrote a blog post on my blog “Singapore Dissident” from my hotel in Singapore on May 29, 2008. On May 31, 2008, in the evening, Singapore police arrested me in the lobby of the hotel because of my blog, which the police initially claimed were related to Emails to judges, which I never sent.

Since the police had ransacked my hotel room and seized my American passport, I could not leave Singapore . I managed to finally leave Singapore on Nov 26, 2008 after I was released from prison.

The complaint against me has been brought by the Singapore Law Society, which we can assume is synonymous with Lee Kuan Yew and the Singapore Government acting through their Attorney General. Unlike democracies with the rule of law, the Law Society of Singapore is not an independent body.

The lawyer representing the Law Society is a Singaporean Chinese lawyer Peter Low. A copy of this is being emailed to him.

There are 5 charges of misconduct in all. The first 2 charges deal with the accusation against me that on July 4, 2008 in the evening near Little India, I used intemperate language against some police officers and that I behaved in a disorderly manner. I was fined $2,000.00 for using intemperate language against the officers and another $1,000 for disorderly behavior. I disputed the charges. The trial last about 18 days in the Subordinate Courts. The Judge was James Leong.

The Tribunal has informed me that all communications should be sent to Angela Chopard head of this Disciplinary Tribunal as well as to her co-worker Yogeswari d/o N Vadivellu , just in case Chopard goes on leave. This is what I have been doing. The ones who would be hearing this case are 2 other people.

Chopard has asked me if I have a lawyer and I have said I have none. It would be silly of me to waste any money to engage a lawyer when I know I will be disbarred anyway. These proceedings are simply Kangaroo proceedings. It is simply a Kangaroo Court. It is a political exercise, not a legal one.

71. I had asked the Disciplinary Tribunal to let me have the transcripts of my court hearing since what has been said and recorded is crucial to my being able to defend myself in these proceedings.

73. The Disciplinary Council has refused to provide me any transcripts at all. To my request that they provide the transcripts so that I can defend myself, their answer was that "I can collect them personally free of charge from the Subordinate Court Singapore or I can send someone else on my behalf to collect them personally". I had pointed out repeatedly that I don't live in Singapore and do not have anyone there to collect them, and requested instead that they mail the transcripts to me to the USA . They have simply refused to do that.

74. Another charge deals with my writing on my blog Singapore Dissident that "Judge Belinda Ang prostituted herself in her position as a judge by being nothing more than Lee Kuan Yew's and his son's employee in the recent case of lee Kuan Yew vs Dr. Chee Soon Juan". Again I have had the same problem in this case with the transcripts. In this case I had written to them asking that they provide me with the transcripts of my hearing since I need them to defend myself in these proceedings. I also asked for the audio recording which is available in High Court hearings. Once again the High Court wrote to me telling me that I could go personally to Singapore to collect the transcripts or I could send someone else on my behalf. Again I told them that I do not have anyone in Singapore and it is impossible for me to send someone from here to Singapore just for this, therefore could they please mail me the transcripts to the USA . They have refused to mail anything to me. As for the audio recordings, they have simply refused to provide it.

75. The reader will see the difficulty that I face in responding to these charges. The transcripts of both courts and the audio recordings of the High court are crucial and absolutely necessary for me to argue in my defense. Without this, I can only do it out of memory and to that extent I am hamstrung.

76. The other problem that I have faced is this. In any proceedings of this nature, it is the duty of the court to ensure that the Defendant is apprised of the proceedings and any rules that apply. I had repeatedly told the Disciplinary Tribunal that it is their responsibility to ensure that this is done. Not surprisingly for Singapore , someone from the Tribunal who calls herself Audrey Lim writes to me stating that she will not send me anything and that any enquiry for transcripts and other matters should be sent to the High Court or Subordinate Court directly.

77. I have not been able to ascertain who she is. I have discovered someone called "Lim Yoon Cheng Audrey" works in the court but when I asked Angela Chopard who heads the Tribunal who this person is, she claims she does not know any person called Lim Choon Yeng. I have therefore ignored this Audrey Lim entirely.

78. The other charge is this. During my case in the Subordinate Court for allegedly using intemperate language to police officers on July 4, 2008, I had made some remarks such as "I have no confidence of getting a fair trial in this court". As you are aware, I was sent to jail for 3 months for accusing Judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean in my blog. While I was still in jail, the Attorney general brought out more charges, this time for contempt of court. The alleged contempt was my having said things like "I don't have any belief that I will get fairness in this court" while I was in the Subordinate Court during my earlier trial. If I challenged these contempt charges, it would mean a longer prison sentence. Not wanting to stay any longer in jail, I naturally apologized and promised not to criticize the Singaporean judiciary or their courts. But since my return to the US , I naturally withdrew any apology made, since I had intention of keeping it anyway, and I re-posted certain blog posts from Singapore Dissident which I was ordered to remove while in Queenstown jail.

79. The last charge deals with my having criticized Judge Judith Prakash in my blog Singapore Dissident in the same manner that I had criticized Judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean. This was done after I returned to the USA last year in 2008 December after my escapade in Singapore .

80. The trial of this disciplinary proceeding has been set for either Feb 22, 2010 to Feb 26, 2010 or March 08, 2010 to March 12, 2010 in Singapore . I have a right to appear and defend myself at trial but you can see the difficulty of this I am sure. Please note that as per your request in your letter dated Nov 4th 2009, the March dates are suitable.

81. First, I have not right to enter Singapore and they have not told me that I can. Secondly even if I am allowed to enter Singapore, I would be liable to arrest and imprisonment because I have written in my blog about Singaporean judge Judith Prakash in similar terms to what I had written about Judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean while in Singapore. If what I did in Singapore was a crime, surely writing about Judge Judith Prakash is also a crime which means another 3 months jail or more for that.

82. Second, as I have gone against the court ruling in Singapore that I will not criticize the Singapore judiciary anymore and that certain blog posts in Singapore Dissident should be removed, since I have done just that, this would mean another contempt of court conviction and imprisonment.

83. I had written to the Tribunal and the Singapore Immigration and Customs Authority whether I have permission to come to Singapore to defend myself.

83. I had written to the Singapore Tribunal for an assurance that I will not be arrested if I entered Singapore because without such an assurance, it would be madness for me ever to enter Singapore . Since these proceedings are commenced by them, it is necessary that they pay for my air travel there and my reasonable accommodation and daily expenses there. Surely a Defendant such as myself is not expected to pay for this, just as you would not expect a fugitive from Singapore to pay for his return to Singapore to face trial. The Tribunal or the Singapore Immigration and Customs Authority have not responded to this at all.

85. If they don't give me permission to either enter Singapore or to guarantee that I will not be re-arrested if I enter Singapore, it would simply result in my being unable to represent myself at the Singapore hearing. How to deny me the right to defend and yet claim that that they have the rule of law is yet to be seen.

According to the Singapore Tribunal, Singapore Immigration and Customs Authority have ruled that I have to apply to enter Singapore . Since I have already done it before in my Email dated Nov 11, 2009 to which they replied stating in their Nov 13, 2009 letter stating "it is receiving attention" why are they asking me to do it again? It does not take much effort to send another short Email to them which I will do now separately and copied to the Tribunal. It will be posted in my blog Singapore Dissident.

86. In summary, the Tribunal in Singapore is refusing to provide any transcripts or audio recordings for any of these cases, evidence which is crucial for any meaningful defense on my part of these charges. They have also flatly refused to let me know whether I have permission to enter Singapore or whether I will be arrested if I returned there.

Response to Charge 1 and 2

87. The charge reads as follows: You, on July 4, 2008 at or about 10.35 pm near the junction of Bukit Timah Road and Race Course Road Singapore which is a public place did use abusive words towards certain public officials namely police officers of the Singapore Police Force in particular Senior Staff Sergeant Kang Wei Chien and Sergeant Noor Azhar Daud by showing.......... (Here follows certain expletives and four letter words).

88. The second charge refers to the same place and time and is as follows:

"You, ................... (same place and time)............. did behave in a disorderly manner to wit gesticulating with your hands and shouting loudly"

89. I pleaded not guilty and went to trial. This trial lasted 18 days in the Subordinate Court, Singapore.

90. As I do not have the transcripts which the Tribunal has refused to provide, I can only do my best based on memory and the few notes I managed to take.

91. I was walking in the evening along Race Course Road Singapore alone towards the junction of Bukit Timah Road . There were a number of cars waiting along the street to merge into Bukit Timah Road which is a main road.

92. While walking along the pavement, almost reaching Bukit Timah Road , I heard some yelling from behind, as if someone were calling out to me. Since I had no business with anyone and no obligation to look I kept on walking.

93. From behind about 5 people came in front of me. None of them were in police uniform. They were rude and they were shouting. They accused me of "knocking” on their police car. I said I did no such thing. I did not know they were policemen. They asked me to tell them who I was and where I was going. None of their business, I thought and politely asked to step aside to let me go.

94. Immediately thereafter with violent force, I was brought face down lying on the tarmac of the Road. My glasses were damaged. While on the floor I was handcuffed. There was a crowd who had gathered. I suffered injuries.

95. The police officers, in particular Staff Sergeant Kang’s evidence, had shown that it would be impossible for me to commit the offense. For instance, in the witness box, he had said that I "continuously and loudly" kept knocking on his car. If so, I had asked him why he did not arrest me there and then, to which he had no answer.

Further since he confirmed that I had knocked his police car “continuously and loudly”, I had asked him how long was it? 1 minute, 2 minutes, 10 minutes, 5 seconds, what? Despite my repeatedly asking it, he did not answer. I had asked the judge to compel him to answer the question but he refused.

If I had in fact “continuoulsy and loudly” knocked on his car, he would have noticed and arrested me immediately. Yet he did nothing but according to him, allowed me to walk away 100 0r 200 meters before he calls out to me!

This is simply nonsense.

96. I had asked him repeatedly if he had seen me knocking on his car to which he answered no.

97. I had asked him when he began to call out to me to stop, to which he answered after I had walked about 100 to 200 meters straight ahead from his car. Yet under cross examination, he stated his car was the first car at the traffic junction. In fact if what he said was true, had I walked 100 or 200 meters from his car, when it was at the street junction, I would have been smack in the middle of the Bukit Timah Road , the Main Road or even beyond that.

98. Not one of the police officers at the trial gave any testimony alleging that they saw me "knocking continuously and loudly" on their police car.

There was no evidence that anyone identified themselves as police officers and they did not show me any badges either.

99. The police took my blood for alcohol testing which confirmed that I was not alcohol impaired.

100. The police sent the car to forensics to see if there were any fingerprints and there was none.

101. The police confirmed that there was no damage to their car.

102. Yet they all said that I went on to hurl obscenities at them and behaved in a disorderly manner.

103. Each and every police officer present at trial religiously repeated under oath that I was disorderly, that I had yelled expletives at them and so on. The next day, Singapore ’s state controlled newspaper the Straits Times reported that as many as 25members of the public witnessed my arrest.

104. Other than the 5 police officers there or so, who gave evidence, giving the same identical evidence that the others gave, not a single independent witness was produced despite the fact that their own newspaper reported there were at least 25 bystanders who witnessed my arrest.

105. When I asked the Investigating Officer why he did not call any independent witnesses to testify, his answer was that at that time, even though there were 5 of them with me alone and unarmed, he was controlling the flow of traffic and could not get the particulars of any independent person. He said he did go there the next day to ask the nearby shopkeepers but no one wanted to help him.

106. The principle in criminal law is the burden is on the prosecution to prove their case beyond reasonable doubt. This was a case that simply had too many doubts, too many inconsistencies.

107. There is no reason why I should have done any of what they said I did and secondly, even if I yelled or shouted, which I must say did not happen at all, it is something that happens every day and if there were prosecutions for this sort of thing, there won't be left anyone outside prison.

108. Under these circumstances, one can only reasonably come to this conclusion. They were looking out for me. It was necessary to make me look bad in Singapore prior to my trial in the High Court for the blogging case which was set for September 2008, for which I was already arrested and released on bail.

109. I think the mistake they made is to not coach their police witnesses to lie properly. Perhaps they also thought it was going top be a breeze with my pleading guilty the first day and the case over. Unfortunately this did not happen and I went to trial.

110. I have some notes that I had taken during the trial. As for their refusal to send me any court transcripts to enable me to know what was exactly said in court, they are obviously trying their best to make it difficult for me to defend these charges.

111. There were a few moments of hilarity during the proceedings. When I told Staff Sergeant Kang that what he was saying was "a figment of his imagination" he asked the judge “what is a figment"! As for the photographer who testified as best he could in English, he did not know what "junction" meant in English. He almost did not know any English at all. Chinese educated old man.

Then we had Vikneswaran son of Socklingam, the Investigating Officer. He kept saying his name was S Vicki. Imagine someone going around at trial and giving a false name. Only under cross examination did I discover what his real name was. This was not just with this man, the Judge James Leong also had an entirely different name as well as the prosecutor who was adamant to remain incognito as Peter Koy when in fact he was Koy Su Hua.

The entire James Leong's Court was trying to hide their true identities as common criminals. At one point, I told the judge that if that was the case, if we could all go around calling ourselves something else, why not call me "Gordon" instead of "Gopalan". Although this request was made in jest as I am proud of Gopalan Nair the judge simply refused the request although this police officer can freely go around under false pretenses!

112. And finally in no country in the civilized world would any lawyer be disciplined with disbarment even if he did what was alleged he did.

Charge no. 3

113. You, in your blog post Singapore Dissident dated May 29, 2008 entitled “ Singapore . Judge Belinda Ang's Kangaroo Court", did make the following offending statement insulting the judiciary of Singapore , namely the Honorable Judge Belinda Ang (Saw Ean): "The judge Belinda Ang was throughout prostituting herself during the entire proceedings, by being nothing more than an employee of Lee Kuan Yew and his son and carrying out their orders."

And you had thereby committed an offense punishable under Section 228 of the Penal Code for which on Sept 17, 2008, you were convicted and sentenced to 3 months imprisonment ....................".

114. There are a number of difficulties with this accusation.

115. Section 228 of the Penal Code reads as follows: "Whoever intentionally offers any insult or cause any interruption to any public servant while such public servant is sitting in any stage of a judicial proceeding shall be punished with imprisonment for a term which may extend to one year or with fine which may extend to $5,000.00 or with both".

116. Any normal reading of this section would require the following elements. One, the Defendant should either insult or interrupt a judge. Two, this has to be done in the presence of the judge. Three, it has to be done while physically in the court while the judge is sitting in judicial proceedings.

117. I did not insult Judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean in her court. I wrote a blog in my hotel in Singapore .

118. Since my action was not in her court in her presence and neither did I interrupt her proceedings, there is no way I can be liable in this section.

119. Furthermore, the case was no longer in session. I wrote the blog on May 29, 2009when the case was already over. On May 28, 2008 Judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean adjourned her court. On May 29 2008 she was "no longer sitting in proceedings". She promised to deliver her judgment on the amount of damages some time at a future date. Therefore it could not be said by any stretch that "she was sitting in proceedings" when I wrote my blog on May 29, 2008 in my hotel in Singapore .

120. The other issue is with the word “insult”. The Constitution of Singapore guarantees free speech and expression. Therefore it was perfectly all right to write my blog criticizing this judge.

121. The other point was the words "prostituting her self during the entire proceedings, by being nothing more than an employee of Lee Kuan Yew and his son and carrying out their orders." I had said specifically clearly that the word "prostituting" was said in relation to her “duty as a judge”. Not as a common prostitute.

122. The meaning of the word "prostituting" in the Webster’s Dictionary is as follows: "to devote to corrupt or unworthy purposes; debase one's talents; devoted to corrupt purposes; a person, such as a writer or painter, who deliberately debases himself or his talents for money". If you read my blog post of May 29, 2008 in Singapore Dissident, this is exactly what this judge was doing shamelessly throughout the 3 days of hearing in the High Court Singapore. This is a correct use of the English Language as to her conduct and therefore can in no way amount to criminal conduct. Please read my blog post of May 29, 2008 in the blog Singapore Dissident.

123. Criminal offense of "insult". Apart from the fact that the Singapore Penal section requires to the insult to happen within the presence of a judge in a courtroom, which was not the case, the "insult" law is itself unconstitutional and void. Under the 1st and 14th Amendment of the US Constitution as well as established English constitutional law, laws which are vague and overbroad are unconstitutional. It is like saying; it is illegal to be "bad". What this means is anyone’s guess. So is the word "insult". The law itself for this reason too is unenforceable.

124. None of this argument flew with Judge Kang Ting Chiu in my trial in the High Court. He said, it was not necessary to be in court for this offense; that the judge was still sitting in proceedings even though she was not in court at all and neither was I when I wrote the blog; that I meant the judge was engaged in "prostitution" even though this was never the meaning; that even though what I said was true, it could still be an insult; never mind any dictionary meanings, I was guilty anyway.

125. Judge Kang Ting Chiu's trial was like that in Alice in Wonderland of the trial of the rabbit who stole the tart!

126. The Tribunal and the Singapore High Court has refused to provide the transcripts or the audio recordings. To that extent this is written from memory.

Charge No: 4

127. "You, did make the following entry in your blog Singapore Dissident on November 28, 2008 entitled "Hello from Fremont, near San Francisco California" "I am defying the undertaking that I gave in court (in Singapore) on September 12, 2008 when I admitted being in contempt of court.........I had also given an undertaking to remove the 2 blog posts of Sept 1, 2008 and Sept 6, 2008 which referred to my trial and conviction before Judge James Leong in the Subordinate Court for disorderly behavior and insulting a policeman, charges entirely made up by the (Singapore) police to discredit me. I will be re-posting those 2 blog posts and stand by every word that I had written in them" and by reason of this you have committed misconduct.

128. On September 12, 2008 I was in prison in Singapore ’s Queenstown jail having been unjustly without law serving a sentence of 3 months jail. On September 20, 2008 I was supposed to be released from jail.

129. At this point, while in jail, the Singapore Police visited me in jail with fresh charges this time of contempt of court for what I had earlier said in Judge James Leong's Subordinate Court . So when I was now taken again to the Subordinate court again to face these new charges, in return for apologizing and undertaking to remove the 2 blog posts, I was given a warning not to criticize Singapore ’s judges again and not to write blog posts criticizing the Singapore judiciary. At this point you realize, I was just about to be released from prison.

130. This undertaking was made against my constitutional right of free speech and expression. Furthermore Judge Leong nor the new judge Leslie Chew of the Subordinate Court on these new fresh charges, were not conducting normal court in the usual sense. These were Kangaroo court for punishing political dissidents for the pleasure of his master, Lee Kuan Yew.

131. The only reason why I gave the undertaking was not to prolong my incarceration in a Singapore jail. I would have said anything in the world just so that my jail term is not extended. I had not intention of keeping my undertaking to that court at all. At the first opportunity of arriving in the US , I broke that undertaking. I withdrew all apologies made and reposted on my blog Singapore Dissident, those blog posts there were ordered to be deleted.

Charge No 5

132. This charge is similar to the Judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean charge. “You, in your blog post Singapore Dissident dated Nov 30, 2008 entitled “Justice Judith Prakash. Another Kangaroo Judge", did make the following offending statement insulting the judiciary of Singapore namely the "Honorable" Justice Judith Prakash: "Judge Judith Prakash of the Supreme Court Singapore has prostituted herself in her capacity as a judge hearing the Kangaroo T Shirt case on Nov 24, 2008 by being nothing more than an employee of Lee Kuan Yew and his son, whom he appointed Prime Minister. By her actions in sending these young men to prison and making them pay crippling court costs of $5,000.00 each, she has shamelessly disgraced herself, her office as a judge, disgraced the Constitution of Singapore and Singapore ."

133. This blog post was written by me after my return to California .

134. The facts were that John Tan, the Assistant Secretary General of the Singapore Democratic Party (Dr. Chee Soon Juan's party), Izrizal and Shafi (2 other members of the said party) were arrested in the High Court between the dates of May 26 to May 28, 2008 wearing T shirts emblazoned with the picture of a Kangaroo in judicial robes.

135. The intention was for them to attend the hearing in Judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean's court while the Lee Kuan Yew case was being heard to give solidarity to Dr. Chee Soon Juan.

136. The police outside her courtroom did not permit them to enter her court. They were arrested outside her court.

137. They were charged for contempt of court.

138. They were clearly not guilty for the following reasons. There is nothing contemptuous of wearing a T shirt with a picture of a kangaroo in judicial robes. They are protected by the Constitutional right of free speech. They were not within the court of Judge Ang Saw Ean. Third, for contempt, the action must be clearly contemptuous, and not open to multiple interpretations. Here merely wearing a T shirt with a Kangaroo's picture is open to multiple interpretations, not necessarily any insult to this particular judge.

Another important point is this. For a contempt case such as this the item itself is the only evidence admissible, in this case the T Shirts. No evidence of intention or otherwise of the user is admissible since they had not said anything.

The police officer in this case was Assistant Superintendant Abdul Razak Zakaria, the same man that arrested me in the Belinda Ang Saw Ean case. He took various statements from the Defendants in stressful circumstances and adduced them in court to prove their intent. This was completely unacceptable. And this judge willingly let her court be misused in this way.

I was seated in the Singapore court for the first 2 days. It was a shameful spectacle. A disgrace. What was going on there was a Stalinist show trial. Not a court one would expect in any democracy.

A lot of time was spent in court by this police officer adducing evidence from statements taken from the 3, to show the intent of the wearers of the Kangaroo T shirt for this shameless judge to join in and say that they intended to insult the court and so on and so forth and therefore they are guilty.

Granted, these judges are well paid in Lee Kuan Yew’s courts, but surely this woman can find a more honest way to make a living.

139. The judge Judith Prakash was shamelessly abusing her position to silence dissent. This she does by sending these men to jail and making them pay costs of $5,000.00. More than just punishing these 3 men, the purpose is to send a chill down the spines of every Singaporean not to criticize Lee Kuan Yew or his judges.

140. The words used by me were apt and correct. It is not misconduct at all.

Conclusion

141. In a sense, it is good that the Singapore Law Society has commenced these proceedings and they will undoubtedly have me disbarred.

142. With the Internet now, I am being tried not just by the Singapore authorities; I am also being tried by the world. It gives me another chance to expose the real goings on in the legal system of that island, a chance which did not exist before.

143. In times before, with the press being controlled in Singapore , it was impossible for the public to know the truth. Now their actions are seen for what they are, and they have to live by their actions.

144. I understand today, the Singapore authorities are struggling to increase the number of lawyers practicing there. In fact for that island of 5 million people or so, with international trade and commerce, there are no more than 3,000 lawyers or so, a totally insufficient number.

145. The reason for this must be obvious. The Singapore legal system and their judges have been so much discredited over these years that all respect for their judiciary or the rule of law is gone. In the past the late JB Jeyaretnam suffered almost decades at the hands of corrupt Singapore judges who were carrying out Lee Kuan Yew's political orders to repeatedly bankrupt and impoverish him and send him to jail. They finally killed him, in a manner of speaking.

146. The same fact befell anyone who dared criticize Lee Kuan Yew or his courts, such as Tang Liang Hong, now in exile in Australia, bankrupt; Francis Seow detained and beaten and now in exile in Boston; Dr. Lee Seow Choh, Jufrie Mohammad, and of course Dr. Chee Soon Juan and not forgetting myself.

147. I take great credit for the fact there are only 3,000 lawyers in Singapore . My writings have obviously had a part to play in that. My message to Singaporeans is this. Don't stop. This dictatorship is weakening. And I shall continue to write.

148. Best Wishes from Fremont California

149. Executed Under Penalty of Perjury by me, Gopalan Nair, in Fremont California USA on November 30, 2009.

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Singapore's Nov 24, 2006 online edition of the state controlled newspaper Straits Times has the shameful story "Newest member of the PSC".

It tells us that Lee Kuan Yew's Singapore government has yet again showered even more prizes over Mr. Philip Jeyaretanm, the son of the late opposition leader JB Jeyaretnam who was hounded and persecuted for more than 30 years by the very same government, all for standing up for his people.

In the recent past, he was made the president of the Singapore Law Society, which we all know is an arm of Lee Kuan Yew's government. Now he is given further honors. He has now been made a member of Singapore's prestigious Public Service Commission.

Frankly this man is not worth writing much about. Simply put, he is a man lacking the slightest of loyalty and integrity that one would expect a son for his father. What is even more disgusting in this case, is the fact that he is a lawyer, and he knows the law, and how it was abused to destroy his father.

He knew all along the litany of prosecutions and defamation actions by this Lee Kuan Yew government against his father had not the slightest of merit. He knew all along that ever rule in the book was being broken and bent to harass, intimidate and destroy his father. He knew that the Constitution protected his father but yet was blatantly violated. He knew all along that his father was the punching bag of Lee Kuan Yew's shameful excesses.

Yet he did nothing. Nothing at all to defend him. Not a word.

Yet this man, not only refuses to raise even a whimper in defense of his father. He goes one disgraceful step further. He willingly collaborates with them. And permits them to cleverly use him.

They use him by giving him honors and accolades, such as "Cambridge educated lawyer" "son of the late opposition leader JB Jeyaretnam", implying they are fair minded towards the opposition, which in fact they never were. With him they are able to argue that they are not out to destroy the opposition, as many accuse them of, which he is permitting them to do it with his collaboration.

We all want to succeed in life, but surely we want to do it with bit of honor and self respect. His willing collaboration with the very same people who destroyed his father shows one thing to us. He is obviously not a man capable of succeeding in life by his own merits. He can only succeed by licking boots, regardless of whether the boots were the very ones which trampled on his father.

He is a disgrace, to the word "son", a disgrace to his profession and a disgrace to the respected University of Cambridge.

Your letters are welcome. We reserve the right to publish your letters. Please Email your letters to nair.gopalan@yahoo.com And if you like what I write, please tell your friends. You will be helping democracy by distributing this widely. This blog not only gives information, it dispels government propaganda put out by this dictatorial regime.

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

With Lee Kuan Yew continuing to rule Singapore in his iron grip, we may well ask, whether the opposition has made any progress.

I think they have.

Lee Kuan Yew being unable to control the Internet, over the last decade or so, the opposition has been able slowly and steadily to expose the the rot within. This was not possible before.

For any political force to succeed, you first have to win the hearts and minds of the people. The rest, will follow. This is the established rule in any contest whether in war or politics.

Through the Internet, we have been able to show the corruption of the Lee Kuan Yew family and cronies. Million dollar salaries, total control of the press, complete lack of human rights, abuse of the Internal Security Act by detaining innocent people without trial, arbitrary police action, abuse of the courts and ad nauseum.

With the exposure of all this abuse of power, the average man in Singapore has not only lost respect for this administration, they find themselves helpless in the clutches of a dictator. This is not a good feeling to have. Those who can leave, leave, with as many as 1000 giving up their citizenship each year. Students abroad refuse to return. This administration is struggling to retain it's talent and finding itself unable to attract truly talented foreigners either.

Tell me which truly talented foreigner would want to make his home in a police state like this!

What is left in Singapore are second rate people with substandard ability and education. Foreigners primarily tend to use the island as a stepping stone to permanent residence in Western countries.

Try as they may, they are unable to hide the truth from Singaporeans and the world, which is that Singapore is simply a police state. If foreigners did not know that at first, they will know it by and by. And when they do, they too will leave.

And it is those lovers of freedom in Singapore and abroad who tirelessly write the truth of Singapore for Singaporeans and the world which has made this possible. And it is to them that credit is due.

Last year I was arrested and thrown in jail for 3 months for criticizing a Singapore judge on this blog. That action made headlines throughout the world, as showing Singapore as a place that throws even bloggers in jail. It is one thing to jail a person for contempt in the face of a court. Quite another to send him to jail for writing in his blog.

Yes, I was inconvenienced somewhat. But the damage I did to this dictatorial regime by provoking the government to act in the way they did was overwhelming. If I was hurt, Lee Kuan Yew and his government was hurt ten fold.

The truth is, Lee Kuan Yew and his government is hurting now, and hurting badly. They can try to put up a smiling face through their state controlled press, but the truth they know is something else.

You have, some ignorant quarters worshipping the masters. They know no better. Those who know are the ones who count. And it is they who are disgusted with Lee Kuan Yew and his island.

More and more people read this blog, and many other blogs who tell it as it is. And this hurts the boys at the top. And they don't like it one bit. And there is nothing they can do about it. They can try to go the Communist Chinese way and block websites, but if they did, it would hurt their pretence in being a information hub even more!

Stay with it, guys. Let the world know the truth. And let us see what the million dollar ministers will do next.

You recall Walter Woon, Lee Kuan Yew's Attorney General who reads every word that I write in this blog. I was arrested under his orders when he read what I had written in this blog in Singapore on May 29, 2008 about the woman Belinda Ang Saw Ean and her biased judgeship.

In an interview he gave to Singapore's state controlled press he justified giving the order to have me arrested because he did not want people going around criticizing his judges. Otherwise, he says, everyone would be going around doing what I did and Singapore's judiciary would be looked upon as a bunch of clowns.

I have 3 questions for him. One, am I not doing the same thing now by writing this, and are not Singaporeans reading this, since it can be read in Singapore. Second if in fact the Singapore judges are truly clowns, why should anyone not be permitted to say it. And third, why is it perfectly all right for an Australian to write that Judge Wisdom Law of Sydney is biased without the entire judiciary there losing respect?

And one final question to Walter Woon who I am sure has read every word in this blogpost. When I returned to California after my imprisonment in your island and wrote even more articles attacking your administration of justice, you told your newspapers that you were, to use your own words "looking into it"; meaning you were deciding what further action to take against me.

Recently the Law Society of Singapore had commenced disciplinary action against me to have me disbarred. Was that the action which you referred to? Surely if that is so, is it not an admission that Singapore Law Society is not an independent body but works under your orders?

If that was not the case, then my question to you is this. Are you still "looking into it"?

Now my dear Walter Woon, try not to pretend that you did not read this blog post. We know you did. You did read the May 29, 2008 blog post about the now famous or infamous Judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean anyway, did you not?

Your letters are welcome. We reserve the right to publish your letters. Please Email your letters to nair.gopalan@yahoo.com And if you like what I write, please tell your friends. You will be helping democracy by distributing this widely. This blog not only gives information, it dispels government propaganda put out by this dictatorial regime.

A few days ago, Singapore's state controlled online edition of the newspaper Straits Times, had reported the Singapore Academy of Law showing college students around the courts and a glimpse of what being a lawyer was. It appears many young lawyers leave the profession altogether after a short time. The propose of the tour was to educate them in advance that it was not "all glamour" as some thought, a means to avoid going into the wrong profession for some.

Rather at cross purposes, I thought, was their advice on how they could aspire to be "international lawyers".

I immediately said to myself again, this story was an utter waste of newsprint.

After having told us earlier that Singapore, a city state with no less than 5 million people, with banking insurance international trade and what not, has just 3,000 miserable lawyers! This was after Lee Kuan Yew's handpicked Minister for Law had told us that it was another London of the East! I am not sure exactly how many lawyers there are in London, but I can tell you there a lot more there than 3,000!

Let me tell this Minister for Law just this. It helps to be honest for once. Singapore has this huge shortage of lawyers simply because there is no rule of law. It is as plain as daylight.

And all your persuasion and cajoling and field trips for school children to courtrooms is not going to help you one bit to solve the problem.

What you should do, if you were honest, which you are not, is this. Tell them right away the truth. Tell them, Singapore is not a democracy. Tell them that your Singapore Constitution is just a whole load of waste paper. It is not worth the paper it is written on. That Singaporeans have no rights whatsoever. And a lawyer leads a shameful existence, pretending to be a lawyer while at the same time living in mortal fear of Lee Kuan Yew.

Tell them there is no freedom of speech expression and every other freedom. They simply do not exist. Tell them it is a police state. And tell them that if that is how they want to live as a so-called lawyer, they would be fine. Otherwise they are going to be miserable.

When I passed the English Bar and returned to Singapore, I was not aware of the pretence that was there. I did not know that it was not the rule of law that existed there, but Lee Kuan Yew's law. Had I known I would never even have practiced law there.

But in the end, it turned out for the best. Living there gave me an insight into the dictatorship that it really was. And my lifetime opportunity to expose it, which I do here.

My advice to Mr. K Shanmugam is to tell young students in Singapore what the Singapore legal system actually is. That way, they will not enter it and end up wasting part of their precious lives in Lee Kuan Yew's courts. And live to regret the wasted years.

Your letters are welcome. We reserve the right to publish your letters. Please Email your letters to nair.gopalan@yahoo.com And if you like what I write, please tell your friends. You will be helping democracy by distributing this widely. This blog not only gives information, it dispels government propaganda put out by this dictatorial regime.

Monday, November 23, 2009

Singapore's online edition of the state owned and controlled newspaper Straits Times of Nov 24, 2009 has the story: "Tougher law on loan sharks". It talks about even harsher brutality to be meted out to any loan sharks messing about in Lee Kuan Yew's city state of Singapore. The laws are brutal enough as they are now, what, with beatings and long prison sentences. It appears that despite this cruelty, the culprits refuse to learn. Now the number of beatings (in Singapore they call it caning) has been almost doubled and so are the prison sentences to run as long as a decade!

I wonder what the reasoning behind this sort of criminal jurisprudence is? Do they really think this cruelty will solve their problem? Or for that matter, is such cruelty acceptable in this day and age?

Let me tell you something about Radzinovich (I am not sure if I got the spelling right) who wrote about criminal sentencing. I read it in 1979 when I did my Bar Finals in England. Dr. R had made a study of the criminal problem in England and compared it with Scandinavia. England had a higher crime rate even though their sentences were more severe, than in Scandinavian countries even though the sentences there were much lighter with prisons even allowing for conjugal visits, generally a much more lenient regimen.

What Dr. R concluded was that the cause of crime has nothing much to do with how harsh your sentences are. It has all to do with your standard of living. Scandinavia had a higher standard of living than England, which explains the lower crime rate.

I also understand that in Victorian England, the penalties were harsh. The death penalty was meted out not just for murder but for a slew of offenses, even minor ones by today's standards. That did not stop crime did it? In fact I read somewhere that in those days pickpockets did a roaring trade while they were watching the hangings in public!

This brutality is not a crime reduction plan for any decent self respecting country in this day and age. And one thing they have to understand is that cruelty begets cruelty. And those who are going to be subjected to it may well say that they too will do as they want, since if they are caught they will be subjected to it anyway. If you are going to be beaten so badly and put away for so long, we might as well make the effort worth while.

With the number of Singaporeans who have been beaten and let loose in public, I wonder whether the man next to you at the MRT has had his butt beaten?

If it is not too rude, should we ask the man next to you "Hey, have you been beaten lately!How many beatings were they?"

What sort of a first world island is that! No wonder anyone with any means are getting out of it fast.

Thank God, when I was in Lee Kuan Yew's jail for criticizing his judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean, I wasn't beaten. There is no beating yet for criticizing a Singaporean judge in that island. But all that may change if there were any more Gopalan Nairs going around criticizing his judges. According to their strange reasoning, they may have to beat future Singaporean judge criticizers to solve the problem!

Your letters are welcome. We reserve the right to publish your letters. Please Email your letters to nair.gopalan@yahoo.com And if you like what I write, please tell your friends. You will be helping democracy by distributing this widely. This blog not only gives information, it dispels government propaganda put out by this dictatorial regime.

Saturday, November 21, 2009

Singapore's state controlled newspaper's online edition of Nov 20, 2009 had this piece of propaganda "Opposition party man cleared."

According to the Singapore newspaper, Mohamed Jufrie Mahmood, who is a Central Committee Member of the Opposition Singapore Democratic Party, had gone to trial in Singapore's courts on a charge that he illegally employed a foreigner in his construction business. This particular offense not only carries a jail sentence, the offender can also be caned, Singapore's brutal law where the accused is officially beaten.

But not altogether surprisingly, he was acquitted and released. For someone not accustomed to Lee Kuan Yew's courts, it would seem strange why I should offer any opinion one way or another, since he was given a trial and found not guilty.

You see, when it comes to opposition politicians in Singapore, when they are charged with criminal offenses, it is not to decide the guilt or innocence of the accused person. It is for the purpose of teaching a political lesson to the accused. Whether or not the defendant actually committed the offense is completely irrelevant.

You see, in such cases the court is not a forum for legal trial. It is where political lessons are taught by Lee Kuan Yew. In some cases, there is severe punishment, like they did to me in sending me to jail for 3 months for criticizing a Singapore judge. In other cases, it could be a warning to stay away, which I suspect was in Jufrie's case.

Jufrie is a respected Malay leader among his community. He knows, as we all do, the racial segregation, prejudice and discrimination against the Singapore Malays, the true natives of Singapore, by the dominant Chinese race of which Lee Kuan Yew is one. The Malays are discriminated in jobs, housing and in many other ways. That is why today, the most menial and underpaid of jobs are reserved for the Malays of Singapore.

Jufrie knows this as well as I do. But until today, since the 1980s as a member of the Workers Party, another opposition party, he has understandably not dared to challenge Lee Kuan Yew head on issues such as race. Although he knows that talking and giving speeches have no real effect at all, he has not dared to organize the Malays or other Singaporeans in any peaceful demonstration for their just rights. He understandably fears Lee Kuan Yew will treat him shabbily if he did, to put it mildly.

I think Jufrie is not guilty at all of any crime. He may not even have known this particular foreigner who is alleged to have overstayed in Singapore. This whole thing, I reckon, has been stage manged as they always do, to teach opposition aspirants what terrible things they can do.

The foreigner was promptly arrested. He was probably told to say he worked for Jufrie. The confession that he very probably made had probably been written out for him by the police themselves. He was probably ordered to implicate Jufrie in return for leniency, which he did.

By why did they acquit Jufrie? Well it is like this. Jufrie has until very recently been non political, only having joined the Singapore Democratic Party recently. So, it was time to send Jufrie a message which is this:

"We can do anything to you anytime we want. This time we are going to let you off. Let this be a warning. Stay away from challenging us seriously. As long as you remain an SDP committee member and no more, that is fine. If you take more active steps and threaten us where it matters, we will impoverish you and finish you off. Think of your business and be a good boy. Be quiet".

Your letters are welcome. We reserve the right to publish your letters. Please Email your letters to nair.gopalan@yahoo.com And if you like what I write, please tell your friends. You will be helping democracy by distributing this widely. This blog not only gives information, it dispels government propaganda put out by this dictatorial regime.

Several young men have written about to wanting to leave Singapore to avoid national service; wanting to know what would happen if they left Singapore without serving.

Many dislike having to lose out 2 or 3 years of their life in running around the bush away from education, feeling they are disadvantaged compared to those who went to university without interruption. Personally my view is that national service for what it is, is good; it keeps you fit, inculcates independence and self reliance; but the decision is yours on what you do.

In other words, it stops you from being a Mambino, Italian for Mamma's Boy.

Firstly, your refusal to do national service will not be grounds to receive asylum or refugee status abroad. That is quite clear from the legal precedents so far on asylum and refugee law.

The good news is, Singapore will not succeed in any application to extradite you to Singapore and furthermore any foreign government faced with an extradition request for an national service deserter will most probably not send you back.

Furthermore I suspect there are certain offenses, usually the serious ones, where extradition is applied for. Even for a country that really lacks the rule of law and any fair and just legal system like Singapore, they probably still will not commence extradition proceedings for national service absconders.

Also, even in the unlikely event that Singapore applied for extradition, the person is not sent back automatically. He is first given a hearing before the foreign court at which time you will raise the reasons why you don't want to be returned; such as lack of democracy in Singapore, lack of human rights, dictatorial rule, no rule of law etc. The courts in the free countries of the world, unlike Singapore, are independent and with Singapore now having a very bad name as an authoritarian intolerant country, you would almost certainly win your case.

But the downside is, Singapore, under the Enlistment Act will arrest and charge you if you ever return to Singapore, regardless of which country's citizenship you hold. Therefore, if you avoided national service and left Singapore, you would never be able to return to Singapore at all; it is so to speak, a life sentence.

For many, this is an unbearable punishment; as they have parents, relatives and family members in Singapore. To some extent now, I am in this position myself, although not for national service reasons.

Since leaving Singapore last November, I had deliberately written some blogs criticizing another High Court judge in Singapore as well as deliberately committed contempt of court of Judge Leslie Chew's order to remove some blog posts, by re posting them. So, it would appear that I could be arrested and sent to jail if ever I returned to Singapore. But in my case, it does not matter much. I wanted to make a point that no one could stop me from exercising my rights as a man, and second, I no longer have any relatives in Singapore.

Singapore's interests has much to gain by me criticising Singapore's dictatorial government since it exposes the truth of Singapore to the world. My inability to return to Singapore is surely a very small price to pay.

If you can, my advice is to serve national service. At least it will make you a little fitter, than the sissys that I find among the Singaporeans. After that, get out of the country and write a letter to Lee Kuan Yew's son and give him a piece of your mind.

Your letters are welcome. We reserve the right to publish your letters. Please Email your letters to nair.gopalan@yahoo.com And if you like what I write, please tell your friends. You will be helping democracy by distributing this widely. This blog not only gives information, it dispels government propaganda put out by this dictatorial regime.

Thursday, November 19, 2009

Not surprisingly, Singapore's state controlled Straits Times online edition of Nov 20, 2009 had this story, "Just too much rain, Bukit Timah Canal bursts it's bank in intense storm". Not surprisingly, because we should all have known that this was coming.

Anyone who has read anything about global warming knows what is obvious. Flooding in Singapore is going to become a progressively common occurrence. So I suppose you have to get used to it. How this is going to effect it's international image, wading in water half the time,I cannot say. Perhaps they could give a new name for themselves, like they usually do, perhaps, "Singapore, uniquely flooding experience"?

The sea is coming in. It is as simple as that.

Do Singapore's world famous duo, the ever litigious, of the "call me names and I will sue you" fame, none other than father son, Lee Kuan Yew and Lee Hsien Loong, have any solutions to this problem from the sky?

Sea water like anything else expands when heated; and so do the waters around Singapore which are hot as it is. With further heating it expands even further.

Anyone taking a walk along Changi Beach or East Coast will confirm this. The water line has advanced much further than what it was a few years ago.

The heavy vegetation and thermal heating of the atmosphere attracts a great deal of rain. Excessive Rain clouds or Cumulus nimbus to be exact. The rain water has to be discharged to the sea and no where else. But with sea level rising coupled with high tides, the water simply cannot get to it.

Many areas of Singapore happen to be very low lying such as Bukit Timah and the Central Business District. No amount of building further canals or deepening/ widening them can solve the underlying problem of the rain working at cross purposes with the sea. Although the coastal areas are all only a few feet above sea level, especially the reclaimed areas, and even though they might hold out for a while more, within Singapore there are large swathes of very low lying areas about which simply nothing can be done.

I wonder what the million dollar Bukit Timah residents including the PAP millionaires themselves are intending to do. Have they not thought about this in their town planning? Frankly there is nothing they can do. If I were in a house in Bukit Timah, I will sell now and get out. Problem is, would anyone want to buy a property which is under water half the time.

I guess, when buying, they should also buy a boat. And perhaps get some SCUBA diving equipment? By the way, it stands for Self Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus (SCUBA). I happen to have read it.

Believe me, it is very relaxing to have a good laugh at the expense of Singapore's strongman and son, the Lee duo. I am sorry to say that you, living in Singapore can have no such pleasure.

Although I am being flippant somewhat about Singapore's father and son team, I am dead serious about what I said of Singapore's floods.

Your letters are welcome. We reserve the right to publish your letters. Please Email your letters to nair.gopalan@yahoo.com And if you like what I write, please tell your friends. You will be helping democracy by distributing this widely. This blog not only gives information, it dispels government propaganda put out by this dictatorial regime.

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Latest news shows Lee Kuan Yew and son, his Prime Minister have collected again in Singapore. This time the victim was the soon to be defunct Hong Kong Newspaper Far Eastern Economic Review, who had said something the strongman and son did not like, about they misusing their power to punish their perennial enemy Dr. Chee Soon Juan.

In this latest defamation case, Lee Kuan Yew and Son, Lee Hsien Loong vs Dow Jones; one of a series of never ending defamation law suits by the duo against their critics; his ever willing High Court has yet again ordered the newspaper to pay the duo, this time, $400,000.00.

Each time they go against their critics in Singapore courts whose judges obediently do anything they want, victory is always certain. I suppose it is the only country in the world where you can successfully predict the outcome of a law suit by who the litigants are. In the history of Singapore, Lee Kuan Yew nor his son have never lost a lawsuit!

Frankly I wonder what these two want to achieve by this. If the point is to prove that the Singapore judiciary is corrupt and beholden to them, it has already been done long ago. If it is to show that no one should criticize them, the message has already been painfully sent a long time ago too. If it is to prove Singapore has no rule of law, they have ably shown the world that too. If it is to show there is no freedom of speech and expression or any other human rights, that too has been clearly established.

What else is the point then? It must be that these two are determined to show the world that it is a pure and unmitigated dictatorship, where there is no means of criticism whatsoever.

And they have also successfully debunked the claim that it is an international legal and commercial hub. It is simply impossible for a island like this to ever aspire to being that. Both father and son have amply shown and proven it.

Today, these two are in fact an impediment to Singapore's progress and an acute embarrassment; for Singaporeans today are known the world over for being cowardly and a people who permanently live in fear. Singaporeans should not wait any longer to unseat them for their own good and self respect.

Since this government rigs elections and imprisons political opposition, it is impossible to unseat them through the election process.

I think that too is quite clear since 1959, with every single elections won unanimously by the PAP, as the 2 miserable opposition members are in fact really their men too.

The only way for change to happen is through peaceful civil disobedience and peaceful demonstrations and protests. I hope that those who care for their country realize this and take the necessary actions to achieve your aspirations.

Otherwise you are doomed to continue living the miserable lives you now lead. As slaves. Lee Kuan Yew's slaves.

Your letters are welcome. We reserve the right to publish your letters. Please Email your letters to nair.gopalan@yahoo.com And if you like what I write, please tell your friends. You will be helping democracy by distributing this widely. This blog not only gives information, it dispels government propaganda put out by this dictatorial regime.

Monday, November 16, 2009

Unlike in the past without the Internet and information entirely controlled through a state controlled press, it was easy for Lee to say whatever he wants. And people believed it.

Now with the Internet it is impossible to hide the truth. The theft of millions by the Ministers calling it a salary, the lack of the basic human rights of free speech and expression is all taking it's toll on what people think of Singapore. With a large section of Singaporeans now with a choice of how they wish to live, no longer have to submit to these injustices.

The highly educated whom the Lee Kuan Yew government needs the most, are simply saying they do not want to play the Lee Kuan Yew game anymore.

They are refusing to be lawyers, refusing to join the Civil Service, refusing to join the Police Force, and refusing even to live in Singapore, opting instead to leave Singapore permanently. The legal profession continues to decline with no more than 3000 lawyers in it, an undeniably small number for a city state of 5 million people engaged in banking and international trade.

As for the civil service, ever increasing numbers are leaving it, and attracting new entrants seems a perennial problem. With the increasing publicity of Singapore policemen going around having to do Lee Kuan Yew's dirty work of arresting political opponents rather than criminals, being part of it becomes distasteful and dishonest, leaving it to people with either no ability or no choice like Assistant Superintendant of Police Abdul Razak Zakaria that I had mentioned in my earlier blog.

Lee Kuan Yew's arrogance, his abusing the law courts and the legal profession; his misusing the police force for his private ends; so with the civil service; so with the teachers; so with every branch of government, that has made just working in Singapore a rather dishonest pursuit.

With crippling lack of real educated capable people to join the management of Singapore, he is left with opportunists who manage to push their weight around, not by reasoned argument and persuasion but by brute force and the violence of his policemen.

The result is the very small pool of talented, but not decent people that he can rely on. Good capable Singaporeans have either withdrawn completely or simply left the country.

What we do have is the small group of largely weak and incompetent reporters in the state controlled press who simply keep churning out the good news and hoping the window dressing of success and achievement is enough.

The numbers are simply not enough. Lee Kuan Yew and his friends will continue to have to turn this way and that looking for good people to stay and work in his city state and, what is even worse, co-operate with him. Unless of course, he understands that no one today has to look up to him simply because he is Lee Kuan Yew. We know who he is and what he does. We know for instance that he was the one responsible for jailing a man without trial longer even Nelson Mandela, Chia Thye Poh for 32 years.

At least apartheid South Africa was better. Nelson Mandela at least got a trial.

We know today that Singapore ministers commit day light robbery of their people paying themselves millions. We also know today of all the other misuses of government that goes on, which people have to accept without any recourse for redress. This recipe is a guarantee that no one with any qualities would want to have anything to do with this regime.

His skilled labor problem will simply remain and increase. Getting more Chinese speaking immigrants or Indians is not the solution to the serious underlaying fault line of instability and collapse. The Chinese do not have English and the good Indians will not stay.

Your letters are welcome. We reserve the right to publish your letters. Please Email your letters to nair.gopalan@yahoo.com And if you like what I write, please tell your friends. You will be helping democracy by distributing this widely. This blog not only gives information, it dispels government propaganda put out by this dictatorial regime.

Thursday, November 12, 2009

There comes a time, among totalitarian regimes when they have such a bad name, they no longer care what people think.

Just as North Korea a repressive dictatorial regime claiming daily to be the best and most humane democracy in the world!

Just as Burma does; countries that don't care anymore what you know.

Singapore similarly has hit rock bottom in its reputation, and knowing it, they say silly things, regardless even if they are simply nonsense.

After all, with a reputation like that, what is there to lose!

A few days ago, Robert Amsterdam, the renowned Canadian human rights advocate and lawyer stationed in London wrote a scathing detailed account of human rights abuses in Singapore especially about Dr. Chee Soon Juan, Singapore's foremost political dissident.

For the past 18 years Lee Kuan Yew unable to silence Dr. Chee, has continued to persecute him, repeatedly jailing and bankrupting him, yet he refuses to give up.

Instead, of condemnation, he receives international acclaim and praise while this government is detested as authoritarian and intolerant of dissent.

Having run out of ideas on how to deal with him, they have now descended to telling outright lies about him and like small children in a quarrel have started calling him names!

This is surely not the hall mark of any nation worth its salt. It is that of banana republics.

To Robert Amsterdam’s article, they responded now with a 10 page document, headed "Singapore Government responds to the "White Paper on the Repression of Political Freedoms in Singapore" by a Canadian law firm", SG Press Center dated November 11, 2009, rebutting whatever Robert Amsterdam had said.

Singapore’s response did not contain a single truth in its entirety.

Surely, with a government owned and controlled media, they can go on telling any lie they want, any time they want, since there is no one to challenge them in Singapore.

But what is disgusting about Singapore’s action was this.

It is one thing to tell a lie and hope to get away with it.

It is quite another to tell a lie knowing your listener knows it is one.

It says "Singaporeans have repeatedly rejected Dr. Chee and his party" pointing out that in Singaporean elections, Dr. Chee's party the SDP polled the lowest votes among the 2 other parties.

Firstly we do not know whether in fact this is true.

For all you know, the elections themselves which are run, not by any independent body but by the Prime Minister's office itself, may have all been rigged to produce the desired result.

Lee Kuan Yew has of course consistently claimed that his elections are fair, but till today, no independent monitors have been allowed to ensure its fairness.

Moreover if anyone even questioned the impartiality of elections, they will be sued impoverished imprisoned and bankrupted with lightning speed, just as the lightning sign in Lee Kuan Yew's political party emblem!

Moreover, Dr. Chee Soon Juan being a highly qualified and capable individual poses the greatest threat to Lee Kuan Yew and his people, if he ever enters Parliament.

Therefore as he has to be stopped at any cost, the media and every organ of state is used at election time to the maximum to vilify and defame him.

Moreover, because of serial numbers on election ballots, the general fear was that if you voted for Dr. Chee Soon Juan's party, you will be discovered and punished.

Under these impossible odds, it was a miracle that Dr. Chee Soon Juan's party got even the number of votes they did.

So Lee Kuan Yew's argument that "Singaporeans have repeatedly rejected Dr. Chee and his party" sounds rather hollow does it not?

It is as if you tie the hands of your opponent in a boxing match and then say you won hands down!

It says "Singapore is a democratic state with a government that is elected through universal franchise".

But in Singapore, there is no independent press; all of it is state owned and controlled.

There is no independent judiciary; they are all beholden to Lee Kuan Yew.

There is no human rights, no freedom of speech expression or assembly, even though these rights are in the Constitution.

The slightest criticism of Lee Kuan Yew, his government or his courts would either land you in jail or bankrupted.

The average man is terrified of his government and his own mouth.

He goes about like a zombie. In these circumstances, how do you say "Singapore is a democratic state with a government that is elected through universal franchise"?

It says Singapore has a "well established legal framework and has an independent judiciary that has been ranked among the top in the world by World Economic Forum, IMD and PERC.

I am not sure how these organizations said what they are alleged to have said, or whether they even said so in the first place.

But I can tell you this. They are simply wrong.

They are somewhere else and simply have no idea of what goes on in Singapore.

They should come and ask people in Singapore how they rank their judiciary.

They should ask Dr. Chee Soon Juan who has been jailed 7 times simply for making speeches or peaceful protests in Singapore whether there is an independent judiciary.

They should ask me, having spent 3 months in jail for merely criticizing Singapore’s judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean; and only then should they come up with these accolades.

Singapore has a corrupt judiciary; corrupt because they have forgotten what being a judge is, that is to be independent and fair.

They have instead become Lee Kuan Yew's servants to do his bidding.

Singapore it says "has a written constitution that is supreme and which guarantees liberties such as the right to life or personal liberty, right to equal protection, freedom of speech, assembly, association and religion".

Big words. Only if this were true.

How do you say you have a right to freedom of speech, when every single newspaper is owned and controlled by the government and to print and publish any literature, you need a permit?

When you are sued whenever you criticize the government?

When you have to apply for a permit even to hold a one man peaceful protest? When, even if you apply for it, you will be denied?

How do you say equal protection when a Tamil cannot live in any part of Singapore he wants, since the government housing agency (HDB) will not allow it?

When the Tamil (although a citizen) is required to live only in government designated areas?

When it is a police state where the police can stop search frisk and arrest anyone anytime without any probable cause, even on trumped up charges?

In these pathetic circumstances, what written constitution is Singapore talking about?

Then this shameless government goes on not only to defame Dr. Chee Soon Juan again, it belittles him. Is this really necessary for a so called government of a sovereign nation?

And what is worse, none of what they say is true. It starts with the words "he was sacked by the University for misusing research funds".

This is what you say, but Dr. Chee has denied ever misusing any funds.

And since you control all the newspapers and Dr. Chee Soon Juan was never given any real opportunity to challenge your allegations, what do you expect any Singaporean to believe?

In these circumstances, I tell you what I believe. I believe you are shamelessly lying through your teeth; other wise you would not be using your state controlled press to disallow anyone else to have a word edgewise.

But you fail to realize that people are not as stupid as you think. We all can see that only a government that is trying to hide the truth will muzzle the press and prevent a contrary argument.

Dr. Chee Soon Juan never did any of those things you say.

He was simply framed, playing by your book of dirty tricks for which you are world famous, with these accusations, merely because in 1991, he had the audacity to join the opposition political party SDP, and challenge you at the polls.

Since he was not prepared to be silenced and neutered, like your poodle Chiam See Tong, he had to be removed; which you did in the only dirty way you know; by trumped false charges. It was as simple as that.

And in your desperation to discredit him which is not very successful, you start by calling him names and mock him, hoping this would somehow lower his standing.

No self respecting nation would have stooped so low like you do here by your reference to his hunger strike, accusing him of "eating a hearty breakfast" every morning and "taking glucose" etc.

Your reference to these things is not only disgraceful; it is also embarrassing for a government of a country.

You then argue that Dr. Chee soon Juan was guilty after all because “he could have sued the University but did not".

And don’t we all know that there was no chance whatsoever of Dr. Chee Soon Juan winning any law suit in Lee Kuan Yew's courts in his entire lifetime?

So does it not seem completely logical that Dr. Chee Soon Juan would do no such thing? This is the sort of argument here that boils the blood of all of us, which is to argue a point which we all know to be completely and entirely untrue.

It then refers to Chiam See Tong, a sort of pseudo opposition politician, as "a respected and honorable man". Surely we are not surprised it says this.

As opposed to Dr. Chee Soon Juan, Chiam See Tong, although not in name, is almost a member of the PAP, Lee Kuan Yew's political party.

Chiam See Tong, as we all know, has been a great asset to Lee Kuan Yew and his PAP.

Lee Kuan Yew knows that for Singapore, it would not look very good in the eyes of the world if every single MP in Singapore were a PAP member, in which case, it would be another Cuba.

So to give it the appearance of a multi party democracy, an opposition member or two in Parliament helps.

So who better to have as an "opposition member" than Chiam See Tong. Chiam never attacks the PAP where it really matters.

He does not question the denial of human rights, of free speech, free press and expression.

He does not engage in peaceful protests.

He would perhaps say a few words on the lack of sufficient parking lots in Geylang, Singapore or some other totally insignificant matter, take his monthly stipend and go home.

He is a tame docile and obedient Lee Kuan Yew lackey, politically impotent and castrated. Surely a man like that for Lee Kuan Yew has to be, in his words, a "respected and honorable man"!

And the lies goes on, such as "Chiam was very unhappy with Dr. Chee's antics", "Dr. Chee maneuvered to oust Chiam" etc etc. In other words, it wants us to believe that Chiam was a good guy and Dr. Chee was a bad one.

What is the point of all this I wonder. Can we not as humans with normal intelligence decide ourselves who is Chiam See Tong and who is Dr. Chee Soon Juan?

And then it says that Dr. Chee Soon Juan fabricated evidence before the Select Committee on health expenditure and was fined.

Frankly we don’t know if this is true and in any case, it has no relevance to Robert Amsterdam's White Paper which claims that Singapore abuses the law to punish political dissidents.

It now talks about the 2001 elections and Goh Chock Tong.

It says Dr. Chee Falsely accused the government of loaning $10 million to Indonesia for which he was sued and found liable.

What Singapore does not tell you here is this. There was ample evidence in Singapore’s own state controlled newspapers that in fact Indonesian President Suharto had asked Singapore for a huge loan during Indonesia's economic crises and there was rampant speculation that in fact the loan was given.

In these circumstances, tell me why it was wrong to question a Prime Minister whether this was the case, since under the rule of law (which Singapore is supposed to have) politicians, especially those in government are required to submit to a wide latitude of public scrutiny, it being in the public interest.

Dr. Chee should never have been sued in the first place and even if he was, the lawsuit should have been dismissed.

In fact not only was Dr. Chee sued and found liable, he was ordered to pay several hundred thousands dollars in damages, an amount which was calculated not to compensate Goh Chock Tong but to permanently destroy Dr. Chee Soon Juan from ever running for political office.

Now the case of Lee Kuan Yew and Dr. Chee Soon Juan in the 2006 lawsuit.

What Dr. Chee Soon Juan said was something to this effect, namely, that if a government owned charity could be so corrupt, what guarantee do we have that the government itself is not corrupt.

Now a statement like this is normal and acceptable in any democracy, merely raising concern over the need for honesty and integrity in government. It was not defamatory at all.

But we know why Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew commenced the legal actions that he did.

2006 was an election year.

This fraud in a government charity looked very bad for him.

So, in accordance with his time honored dirty tricks, he sued using his corrupt judiciary.

What we are not told is that Judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean, this shameless woman whose career is primarily running around doing Lee Kuan Yew's errands, denies Dr. Chee Soon Juan even a trial.

She decides the case merely on affidavits privately in her chambers!

Dr. Chee Soon Juan is not allowed to produce any witnesses!

Lee Kuan Yew or none of his witnesses is subject to cross examination.

The case is found in favor of Lee Kuan Yew, to use the pun on his political party emblem, with "lightning speed".

Some time later, this same shameless woman of a judge, Belinda Ang Saw Ean, hears the case to decide the quantum of damages.

If there was ever a more shameless spectacle of a travesty of justice, I am not aware of it.

I went to Singapore specifically to attend this hearing and was present throughout the 3 shameful days in court.

I wrote about it in this blog Singapore Dissident on May 29, 2008 "Singapore Judge Belinda Ang's Kangaroo court" the following words " The judge Belinda Ang was throughout prostituting herself during the entire proceedings by being nothing more than an employee of Mr. Lee Kuan Yew and son and carrying out their orders".

In my blog, I said many other things about this judge of course, but for these words, I was charged and convicted in Singapore and jailed for 3 months.

How shamelessly this judge behaved is written in my blog.

The case was not a case at all.

It was a public lynching of Dr. Chee Soon Juan and Miss Chee Siok Chin.

And why I say that this government has no shame at all to lie is this.

In court, disregarding the Singapore journalists who will shamelessly lie for their state owned newspapers, there were several journalists from free and democratic countries present.

They saw the shameful spectacle.

Yet this shameless government says “they (Dr. Chee and Siok Chin) behaved outrageously throughout the proceedings"!

We know who was outrageous and it was not Dr. Chee Soon Juan or Chee Siok Chin.

What Lee Kuan Yew's Singapore does not say is the amount of damages awarded against Dr. Chee Soon Juan and Chee Siok Chin.

Not surprisingly in Singapore’s unique legal system, and as expected, it was more than $400,000.00 (approximately US$ 300,000.00).

And what is more, at the end of the 3 day hearing, the judge, to please Lee Kuan Yew even more or perhaps directly under his orders, sends Dr. Chee Soon Juan and Chee Siok Chin to jail for 2 weeks for contempt of court!

Then Lee Kuan Yew's Singapore come up with various instances of Dr. Chee Soon Juan breaking the “law” by his civil disobedience.

What law are they talking about?

In all these cases Dr. Chee Soon Juan either spoke or held a peaceful protest on matters of public interest.

There was nothing illegal about his actions.

The Constitution specifically gives these rights to citizens.

Lee Kuan Yew's government had made laws to make these constitutional rights illegal by requiring permits to speak or assemble in public. And what is worse, there is no point in applying for any permit because in Singapore’s entire history, no permits were ever granted the opposition.

Constitutional law under common law specifically disallows the making of laws in violation to the Constitution, which is supreme.

Dr. Chee committed no crimes at all in his conducting peaceful protests or public speaking. Lee Kuan Yew' Singapore is simply telling a shameless lie by saying this.

Lee Kuan Yew's Singapore then claims that Dr. Chee Soon Juan committed contempt of court because Singapore has great judges and an "independent judiciary".

I suppose North Korea will say that too. Lee Kuan Yew's Singapore can say all they want of course, it is quite another thing if anyone believes them.

Lee Kuan Yew's Singapore then talks of freedom of assembly, yet restricts that right, by requiring permits, which they say are necessary to, believe it or not, “prevent terrorism”.

Very conveniently said, is it not? Terrorism!

Where in Heavens did the Singapore government get the idea of Dr. Chee Soon Juan being a terrorist! Dr. Chee Soon Juan is no terrorist.

Why then all this talk of terrorism?

Very simply put, Singapore has no excuse to deny the right of citizens the right to peaceful assembly. Lacking any argument whatsoever, you can expect a morally bankrupt country to talk about such irrelevance, would you not?

This government talks of their illegal detention of their citizens without trial under the Internal Security Act.

Their argument of course is totally wide off the mark, since they have no justifiable argument whatsoever.

They defend this illegal practice claiming it was introduced by the British.

What has a law that was introduced by the British more than half a century ago got anything to do with reality of Singapore now, you may to ask.

If the British had introduced the punishment of pulling out fingernails, would Lee Kuan Yew have still retained it?

Does the simple fact of it being introduced by the British somehow give it legitimacy?

And then they claim that the prisoner is allowed visits etc etc. We should tell Lee Kuan Yew and his government that detention without trial of Singapore citizens in their own country is simply wrong.

If you have evidence, then try them. If not, simply shut up.

Don't give us a history lesson of the communist threats. Those things were in the past, many moons ago.

Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew then goes on to defend his regular use of defamation lawsuits to silence dissent by his subservient judges routinely ordering damages of hundreds of thousands of dollars against Lee’s political opponents merely for commonplace criticism.

Dr. Chee Soon Juan, JB Jeyaretnam, Tang Liang Hong, western newspapers such as the Economist and Wall Street Journal have all been sued through Lee Kuan Yew's favorite weapon, the defamation law suit.

And in all these cases, if you were to examine what they had said, I am sure you would not find a single instance of actionable conduct.

Not a single instance.

But yet in all of them, they were all found guilty, the judgments were all in hundreds of thousands of dollars and they were all bankrupted.

Perhaps the single fact which gives the cat away is that every one of them were politicians and the criticism was against Lee Kuan Yew and his government.

I suppose that very well explains the abuse of Lee Kuan Yew's law and his corrupt judges without more.

Singapore then goes on to defend Chiam See Tong and Low Thia Khiang, 2 miserable opposition members in Singapore's Parliament of 84 members of which 82, mind you 82, are PAP members.

This by itself should tell the inquiring mind a great deal about Lee Kuan Yew's style of democracy.

As I said, these 2 opposition members serve the purpose of Lee Kuan Yew and his government and do nothing for the cause of the opposition.

They are, as I said, lauded and extolled as model opposition politicians. Why, because they do nothing for the opposition.

They may make some quiet noises about something completely irrelevant in Parliament such as the parking lots in Hougang or Potong Pasir, and quietly go home.

And of course they collect their monthly stipends.

And because they are such good opposition politicians, for Lee Kuan Yew that is, they get some government contracts which benefit their private businesses.

Beyond that they don't do much.

Coming to JB Jeyaretnam, not satisfied that Singapore has persecuted and hounded him throughout his political career, they now want; it seems; to defame his name even after he is dead.

I need not defend JB Jeyaretnam.

Singapore knows JB Jeyaretnam, the champion of his people who fought so hard for their dignity and was throughout his career repeatedly sued bankrupted hounded and jailed for no crime whatsoever, except that he was a threat to the continued power of Lee Kuan Yew and family.

I know him personally as a member of the Workers Party from 1984 to 1991.

All I need to say about JB Jeyaretnam is this.

From as early as the 1970s, Lee Kuan Yew was terrified of JB Jeyaretnam as a threat to his position which meant that from that time till he died, Lee Kuan Yew brought a series unrelenting trumped up lawsuits without any basis whatsoever against him which finally ruined and killed him.

JB Jeyaretnam was a great man. And his name will live in eternity.

Now Singapore refers to the case against me, Gopalan Nair.

It starts off with a lie as follows "Mr. Gopalan Nair had sent an email to various people in Singapore (including the Attorney General) making various scandalous allegations against justice Belinda Ang (Belinda Ang Saw Ean)a judge of the Supreme Court."

This statement is a lie, and Singapore knows it.

This is what happened.

I was in Singapore High Court attending the hearing for the assessment of damages of Lee Kuan Yew's defamation case against Dr. Chee Soon Juan and Chee Siok Chin from May 26 2008 to May 28, 2008.

I was seated in court in the visitor’s gallery and observed the proceedings.

I found the conduct of the judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean disgraceful and shameful.

She did not appear to act as a judge at all, but was there only to please Lee Kuan Yew and his son and do whatever they desired.

It was not only a shameful sight, it was almost embarrassing, not just for a judge but for any human being to crawl so low.

On May 29, 2008, I wrote a blog post in this blog entitled Singapore’s Judge Belinda Ang's Kangaroo Court."

In it I detailed to the best of my memory what I remembered to be some of the most shameful instances of bias on the part of this judge.

One of my statements in the blog post was "The judge Belinda Ang, was throughout prostituting herself during the entire proceedings by being nothing more than an employee of Mr. Lee Kuan Yew and his son and carrying out their orders."

I had never sent anyone any Emails as this Singapore report claims.

On May 31, 2009, at about 8.30 pm, I was arrested by about 5 plain clothes policemen as I was descending the elevator in my hotel at the lobby.

I was immediately handcuffed in the elevator, manhandled, taken back to my hotel room on the 7th floor and there my room was ransacked in my presence.

Among the items seized were my passport and a handwritten note book which contained various personal particulars among which was my Yahoo Email address user name and password.

I was interrogated day and night several times. Several times in the middle of the night and early morning hours.

They were trying to break my spirit.

This was torture no less.

The interrogations were as many as several times a day. They were unrelenting.

Each time I was taken from the cell, placed in handcuffs and taken to an interrogation room. There my one hand was handcuffed to the bench I sat.

Inspector Abdul Razak Zakaria was a Malay Muslim man in his 40s with a boyish face.

He told me he was very recently promoted Assistant Superintendant.

Almost every day, he showed me several emails which had my Email address. However the sender was Pallichadath Gopalan Nair, a name I have not used since 2004. I have used the name Gopalan Nair only.

These emails had attachments of my blog posts from this blog Singapore Dissident including the blog post about Judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean's about which I wrote.

They were addressed to various important people including Judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean herself, the Attorney General and Solicitor General among others.

I had never sent any of these Emails.

ASP Abdul Razak Zakaria kept insisting that I sent these Emails and I kept repeating that I never sent any of them.

He kept saying that it had my email address on them, therefore I must have sent them.

I kept telling him that I wrote the blog post about Judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean, but I never sent these Emails.

I told him that I did write these blog posts. That Singapore Dissident is my blog and all the blog posts were written by me.

But I never sent any of these Emails. I told him there was no need for me to send anyone any Emails, since I had my blog.

This Malay policeman's interrogation was unrelenting.

He asked me to admit that the Emails were mine.

More than once he said he said he was going to charge me under the Sedition Act threatening me with 3 years in jail, an inducement of sorts, that perhaps if I admitted sending these Emails, he would instead be lenient?

The fact is I never sent any of these Emails that he produced. And I simply told him that I was not prepared to admit to sending any emails, no matter what he did.

Frankly I do not know whether these Emails were in fact sent or by whom, although the suspicion is this man, ASP Abdul Razak Zakaria who got possession of my Email address and password, himself sent it, or got others to send it, I have no idea.

During my trial, the prosecution brought in the secretary of Judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean who said in court that she received Emails to which my blog posts were attached from a sender named Pallichadath Gopalan Nair. So did the private secretaries of other judges.

I cross examined Abdul Razak Zakaria on the witness box for several days.

I asked him if he checked the contents of my notebook to which his answer was "that he glanced through it".

I suggested to him that he must have gone through the book with a fine tooth comb, to which he answered (hilarious) that he did not know what a fine tooth comb had to do with this case! His English was poor.

I had told him and the judge throughout the trial that I admit writing the blog post and I am very proud of it and stand by every word in it.

But I never sent any Emails. In any case, I had no reason to send Emails to this judge or anyone else, since I had my blog and the world will read it.

The judge admitted that there was no evidence that I sent any Emails and I was not being charged for any Emails.

Despite this; despite the fact that it was never proven that I sent any Emails to anyone, this Singapore report shamelessly states categorically that I sent Emails to various people!

Yes, I did write my blog then as I am doing now, but accusing me of sending Emails when this was not proved at all, shows how low this government would go in their desperate attempt to salvage their reputation, which unfortunately has irretrievably sunk rock bottom.

One interesting occurrence during the 8 day trial was this.

I was cross examining Abdul Razak Zakaria on the stand during the Muslim month of Ramadan, the Muslim holy fasting month.

During this time it was particularly important for Muslims not to offend by religious indiscretion, one of which is of course lying under oath.

Zakaria being a Malay Muslim is conditioned by his religious and superstitious beliefs.

The Malay Muslim, by their superstition and beliefs, believe that to take the oath to God and to lie is a mortal sin, which they cannot reconcile during their prayers to Allah, which by the way, I assume Abdul Razak Zakaria does.

So I took very careful care to ensure that he took the oath to tell the truth, which meant in this case to Allah.

I then asked him whether he was a Muslim to which he answered yes.

I then asked him whether it is a sacrilegious and blasphemy to tell a lie under oath and he said "Yes".

I asked this a number of times to drive home the message at which point both the prosecutor and judge objected that I should refrain from reference to his religion.

But the damage was already done. Abdul Razak Zakaria was put on the spot. There he was in front of a court and audience, having taken the oath before God and now he would have to lie. He was uncomfortable. .

Zakaria seemed particularly irritable and discomfit when I asked him if he lied when he said, he did not send any Emails using my Email address; that he did not know anyone who sent these Emails; and that he did not collaborate with the Attorney General or others in stage managing this Email accusation.

I pointed out to him that among the Malay Muslims, when they have committed some offense against Allah as serious as lying under oath, they and their offspring and their descendants would suffer the wrath of Allah.

He was particularly nervous when he acknowledged this before an audience in court.

It might be interesting for the reader to contact the Central Police Station, contact particulars above, and speak to Abdul Razak Zakaria and ask him again whether he lied under oath and as to who it was that sent those Emails.

It might be interesting to ask him whether he or his family members have recently suffered any calamity resultant on the wrath of Allah for lying under oath during Ramadan?

In fact the criminal charge that I was charged with had nothing to do with me. I was charged under Section 228 of the Singapore Penal Code (Lee Kuan Yew’s law) which read "Whoever intentionally offers any insult or causes any interruption to any public servant, while such public servant is sitting in any stage of judicial proceeding shall be punished with imprisonment for a term which may extend to one year, or with fine which may extend to $5,000.00 or with both"

This charge clearly refers to someone who was physically present in court and while there, in the presence of the judge, either insulted her in person or caused a disturbance. On the 29th of May 2008, the court of Judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean was not in session hearing this defamation case. And I was not in her court on that day.

I had said nothing to her in her court or interrupted her proceedings. All I did was to write a blog in my hotel a day after the case was over, that is, on May 29, 2008. By any reasonable reading of this criminal provision, I was not guilty at all.

Second, the charge itself was vague and overbroad. It refers to an "insult". What is an insult is never defined. I had argued at the trial before Lee Kuan Yew's stooge of a judge Kang Ting Chiu that what I had said was true. To “prostitute oneself” is according to all the dictionary definitions, to debase one's profession or calling for an improper personal gain. There is no doubt this is what Judge Belinda Ang Saw Ean was doing in the Lee Kuan Yew defamation case.

I argued that if what I said was true, there cannot possibly be an insult. The judge would not accept it. According to him, believe it or not, even if it was true, it could be an insult! According to him, believe it or not, it would be an insult, to tell someone "your father is a drunk". He was not prepared to listen to the argument that in Lee Kuan Yew's case, my comment was perfectly acceptable as it was a case of great public interest and notoriety.

Lee Kuan Yew's Singapore refers in the article that I had said perhaps the word "prostituting" was too strong, and by my saying so, it therefore became a criminal act! Surely there can be no more stupid argument than that!

Yes, the words "Belinda Ang prostituted herself during the entire proceedings....” may be a little strong. Perhaps I could have said that “she shamelessly abused her authority” or even that “she thoroughly misused her position” etc. But using a stronger or more moderated language does not detract from the fact that the words used were factually true in the English language; it was not vulgar or offensive; and it is a phrase that is acceptable in the usual and normal usage of the language.

Nothing that I said mattered to the judge. Perhaps, he already had orders from Lee Kuan Yew that I not only was to be punished, but also the length of the prison sentence.

Now the case of Tang Liang Hong.

Tang Liang Hong merely had the audacity of standing for elections against Singapore’s "Glorious Ruler" Lee Kuan Yew and to correctly accuse him of getting personal favors for himself and his entire family, in the form of discounts for the purchase of Apartment units in Jade Apartments.

These revelations if proven would fly in the face of Lee's claims that he is not corrupt.

So he does the only thing he knows.

He gets his compliant judges to go against Tang Liang Hong. We have heard of that dirty trick before for sure. Nothing more need be said.

In conclusion it says Singapore has grown prosperous because of its rule of law.

We don’t know whether it is in fact prosperous but we do know there is no rule of law.

As for prosperity, in a country where the average man has to eke out a living with a salary of about US$6,000 per year with a very high cost of living; and while the top few like Lee Kuan Yew and his corrupt judges earn several millions a year is hardly prosperous by any yardstick.

What the report does not say is that as many as 5,000 highly educated skilled Singapore citizens leave Singapore permanently for foreign residence; sufficient numbers of children are not being born; one in every 3 Singaporeans is a foreigner and we have very poorly qualified men being made Assistant Superintendants of Police like this man Abdul Razak Zakaria.

Your letters are welcome. We reserve the right to publish your letters. Please Email your letters to nair.gopalan@yahoo.com And if you like what I write, please tell your friends. You will be helping democracy by distributing this widely. This blog not only gives information, it dispels government propaganda put out by this dictatorial regime.

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About Me

Determined to find the Truth.
Born Singapore, educated Winstedt School 2 (next to Monks Hill in Newton, Singapore) Raffles Institution, National Service, some travel in Europe, then law studies England, return to Singapore, practiced for 10 years, active Workers Party member, stood elections 1988 and 1991 in Singapore, was harassed and persecuted by Lee Kuan Yew for my political beliefs, left for USA, obtained asylum and admitted California State Bar, practice law ever since in Fremont California near San Francisco. Relinquished Singapore citizenship 2005 because I was not prepared to permit Lee Kuan Yew to unjustly retain my CPF funds if I remained Singapore Citizen. On principle, the only correct thing for me to do was to give it up, for my CPF funds. I am an American Citizen as of 2004.